"How are the sessions going, Ha Jun?" Dr. Kim asked. She sat on a high back white leather chair, her posture straight with arms lightly resting on a notebook on her lap where she would discreetly jot down notes on today's visit. 

"It's going well, I guess. Ms. Choi seems very capable; everyone looks like they've settled down on the weekly routine." He sat on the sofa, his posture much more relaxed than the last time he was sitting there. He sat forward, hands clasped in front of him, elbows resting on his knees. But his shoulders were no longer hunched with tension and his face not as haggard as they used to be. Dr Kim's keen clinical eyes noticed these slight changes not just because she has come to know him very well, but because the palpable strain that used to be visible in his demeanor has somewhat abated. 

"But what do you think about the whole thing? Has it been helpful?" She prompted.

"I think it has. The grief the others carry is quite heart-rending; the evenings get very emotional sometimes. To be honest, I've mostly listened. I haven't been able to talk about Ha Jae, at least not with the group."

Dr. Kim picked up on this distinction easily enough. "That's all right. Not everybody can open up and unburden to others, be they strangers or one you've known forever. Have you paired up with someone?"  

Ha Jun did not quickly answer, not recognizing the question was posed at its face value. "I met someone." When Dr. Kim did not immediately answer, he finally caught on and flushed to the tips of his ears. "I thought...No, Ms. Kim has not paired us off in smaller groups."

"This girl, is she someone you can talk to?"

“Yes. Aside from you, she’s been the only one I can talk to about Ha Jae comfortably.” He paused. “She’s been with Ms. Choi for almost a year now, helping her with the groups as they come along. She’s suffered the loss of someone too so there’s the shared empathy not just the sympathy. She's easy to talk with.”

“And how was the conversation about Ha Jae?”

He shrugged and took a breath before responding. “As well as could be. We talk about other things too, not just Ha Jea or her friend that she lost. Knowing about her situation, I find her strength quite admirable.”

“I find your connection with..?” Dr Kim asked. 

 “Seon Mi,” he volunteered easily enough.

“Yes, thank you. I find your connection with Seon Mi quite positive. How do you feel about this friendship?”

Dr. Kim waited for further elaboration. Part of her job has been to encourage healthy introspection, self-awareness, admission and acceptance.

“I…I haven’t felt this strongly about anyone before." Ha Jun looked briefly at Dr. Kim.

He continued, “Don’t get me wrong, Ha Jae and I have had our share of relationships. He was quick to fall in love and he fell in love so many times. You might call him a serial monogamist, but he made whichever girl he loved feel like she's his everything during their time together. He was the social butterfly, the extrovert one of us. He didn't mind showing how he felt. He loved effortlessly, frequently. Maybe deep down in his psyche he knew he didn't have much time in this world, so he went ahead and lived and loved as much as he could." He took a deep breath before continuing.

"Me, I have always been the reserved one. He and I were far from being this perfect concept of a man. Maybe if we became one person, we might have been closer to this ideal man every woman searches for. That was what his last girl said to us.  We were both seeing sisters back then. It didn't work out between Ha Jae and the girl. And so it eventually got awkward for me to continue seeing her sister."

"Were you in love with this sister?" 

"No. It wasn't difficult to end that relationship. And I know my brother very well; he may have fallen in love many times but we were both still searching for that one person that was meant to be in our lives forever. I sound romantic, don't I? " He gave Dr. Kim a smile. "Ha Jae was really the romantic one."

"Do you think this friendship is much more with Seon Mi?"

Ha Jun took a moment before answering. "I haven't stopped thinking about her. For once I stopped wishing for the night to be over when we were together. I'm obsessing and it's an unfamiliar feeling."

"Does she share your feelings, Ha Jun?"

"She has not given me any indication it's otherwise. I...I think she cares about me."

"I like this positiveness in you. Tell me, symptomatically, has there been improvements, changes that are discernible?"

He shifted on the couch, leaning back as he considered the question. "I've completed several paintings since you were gone. It is still an effort sometimes to finish but I did manage to complete some." He could here the faint scratching of Dr. Kim's pen on her notebook and her murmurs of encouragements. He continued, "the thought of sculpting and drawing again is not as repugnant."

He looked down on his hands thoughtfully. "I couldn't stand the thought of touching clay after Ha Jae died. I felt like it was because of me that he got into that accident. If I didn't make such a big deal about him wasting my clay at the studio, he wouldn't have had to go and get more. If I hadn't been particular about eveything, he wouldn't have felt the need to go the store that only sell my particular clay; he wouldn't have needed to be on his bike coming back home that exact hour, be in that particular spot in the street when the accident happened. I could have easily told him that evening, 'gwenchana, its no big deal, I'll get more next day.' But I was being in one of my moods, stressing about a worthless project, made him feel guilty enough to go and replace the clay mix he dumped by mistake."

"And this guilt you carry, Ha Jun, is it easing up?"

"Easing up? I suppose; maybe since I finally want to sculpt again. But the guilt is still there. I still feel like it's my fault Ha Jae's gone. I know how unreasonable that sounds. This guilt, I don't think it will ever go away. I might as well have been the one that pushed him onto that oncoming traffic. I played a hand in causing his fate and I will carry this guilt forever."

Dr. Kim paused in her note-taking. She peered over her glasses at him. "Ha Jun, we talked about this before too. Why do we feel guilty? Is it because we're alive when someone else did not survive? Because we felt we did or did not do something that caused that person harm? Guilt is an emotion, one that everyone carries, realistically or not. And just like any emotion, it is not something we can magically erase, but something we can keep within manageable bounds."

Dr. Kim paused to let her words sink in. "You told me how that day happened. It was a typical day for both of you, right?"

"Yes." Ha Jun sighed, leaning further back on the couch, eyes trained on the ceiling. He didn't need prompting, his mind is quick to recall this fateful event. They were both in good spirits actually that day.  Ha Jae was yet again talking to Ha Jun about a girl he met, prodding his brother to go on a double date with this girl's friend. This was typical with Ha Jae with his girlfriends. Handsome eligible young men such as him were a catch indeed and whenever his dates would find out he had a twin brother to boot, Ha Jun was often dragged by his brother to these conditional dates with whichever girl he happened to be dating. Ha Jun had frequently been dragged along, a blind date to Ha Jae's girl's friend, sister, or cousin, and so on.  

That time, Ha Jun had a project that neared its deadline and he was hard pressed to complete. He had decided to do a series of sculptures rather than paintings this time. Although he has been known to interpersed his work with various media and has become well known for both his paintings and charcoals, this would have been the formal presentation of his pieces in clay. However Ha Jae had moved various items in their work area and mistakenly disposed of his clay mixture. 

"I carried on and on about how stressful this was. Looking back, it was hardly Ha Jae's fault. I had thrown his sheet music in the past and he hardly gave me a brow beating. But I was being an that day."

Dr. Kim interjected, "You recall yourself being difficult but you told me you didn't insist on Ha Jae leaving and getting more clay, isn't that right?"

"I didn't asked him to go, no. But I made him feel guilty. That's just as bad, isn't it."

"I think sometimes we rely on our guilt which end up coloring our memories." Dr. Kim thumbed through her notes, going through past sessions' documentation for reference. "You said he was laughing as he insisted on going to the store, even said he was joking around."

"He was," Ha Jun replied. He smiled in recollection how Ha Jae , calling his brother out for being ornery because he 'must not have gotten any recently' and his own response by cursing Ha Jae out good naturedly. He remembered how Ha Jae just laughed in his face. He even yelled out to Ha Jun as he was leaving, 'and don't wait up for me; I'm swinging by Ai Jie's place in case she's free.' And wiggled his eyebrows and smirked obnoxiously at him as he walked out, helmet in hand.

"Would he have gone out regardless whether he needed to go to the store or not?" Dr. Kim prompted.

"He was planning on meeting Ai Jie, this new girl he was dating, that evening. I found out later on that they did meet briefly; she got free much earlier from her engagement and so he was coming home to drop off the clay and get his car instead. He was going back out to meet her."

"So you can potentially say that it had nothing to do with you, that Ha Jae made his own decision to leave and come back home, right?" She said gently. 

Ha Jun is quiet. His mind processing this, welcoming any excuse that would assuage some of his guilt. He heard Dr. Kim continue on, "I believe now that you can think rationally it's time to factor in other things that came in play that day. Ha Jae was not a person that would be pushed to do something he didn't want to do. He was just as stubborn as you, if I may recall you say. He left the house for other reasons, getting the clay was not his only intention. He went to see his girl, came back to get his car to potentially spend more time with the girl that evening. What happened was truly an unfortunate accident, but it was hardly any of your decision making alone. We all make decisions that impact those around us, but we fail to realize these same people do make their decisions freely as well. There are many spokes to a wheel, each one plays an integral role in order for the wheel to turn. Same with life and the decisions we each make." 

Dr. Kim moved on to a different topic. She knew he will need to process this on his own and come to terms with accepting and changing his way of thinking in order to manage his guilt and his grief. She is pleased at the progress he has made finally in being open to thinking of the past in a broader scheme of things.

.

Ha Jun came home and dropped himself down on his sofa, feeling emotionally drained after his session with Dr. Kim. Maybe he is making progress to feel as drained as he is right now. If only it were easy to tell your heart to follow what your mind could rationalize away so easily. He really hopes he is making progress. He can finally see a little glimmer of a future, one that seems to involve a certain someone fairly recently. He thought back to the last part of his conversation with Dr. Kim when she had asked him about his sleeplessness.

He told her about that night with Seon Mi after she had cried her heart out to him and fell asleep in his arms, and how he in turn finally found the kind of sleep his body has been missing for months. How for the first time after such a long time, he slept much like a normal person would, as if the night finally reliquished its hold on him and let him succumb to his dreams.

His thoughts went back to that evening. She slept fitfully, her head resting on his shoulders, her warm breath on the hollow of his neck. And that one night he finally felt human again, feeling emotions he did not expect to feel. If he had any doubts about his feelings before, that evening made things all the more certain for him. He didn't set out looking for anyone; he hadn't been looking for anybody to save him from himself. But he found her and she did anyway and captured his heart in the process.

He remembered waking up, covers tucked securely around him, the soft cool breeze of the early morning ruffling his hair. He looked around and found himself alone on the rooftop. It was still very early, the sun barely breaking in the horizon; all around him the hum of the city is still muted as it just woke and stirred to life girding itself to begin another day. He stood and stretch, feeling unused to the once familiar sense of calm only a restful sleep could bring. He left the rooftop and opened the door to go downstairs, following the faint sounds of cooking further in the house.

He stood and watched her for a while; she was busy puttering around the kitchen cooking and humming a soft little tune under her breath. Romie cat sat quietly off to the side watching him watch her, offering a soundless miaow in greeting. Sensing Ha Jun's inattention, the cat finally grew bored and laid itself down, lifting a paw to clean his whiskers.

She must have sensed him watching after a while for she turned around to face him all startled. They shared an electrified look until she dropped her eyes, breaking their eye contact first. 

"I didn't want to wake you when you were finally sound asleep," she offered tentatively. He walked over to where she was and bent down to catch her eyes once more.

"Are you alright?" he asked. She went on to continue finishing various dishes for their breakfast while nodding at him. "Yes, I'm fine. Did you finally sleep well, Ha Jun?"

"I did. Thank you. I have forgotten how restful a proper sleep felt."

She was shy thinking about how she found herself tightly wrapped in his arms when she woke, her arms braced around his chest. He was so close she could feel his lips resting on her forehead, the way his chest rose with each drawn breath, the warmth of his arms under the quilt covering them. She felt warm again at his nearness, upon finding his eyes still glued to her seeming to pin her in place.

Throat dry, heart racing, she lifted her eyes to meet his and hoped her voice did not betray her discomposure. "I'm glad you rested well. Thank you for spending the night with me, Ha Jun." And blushed anew as the implication of her statement dawned on her.

Ha Jun smiled and reached out to tuck an errant piece of hair behind her ear; his actions familiar, comforting, endearing. His hand lingered by her cheek, giving it a light caress. 

"I'm here for you, just as you have been for me, Seon Mi. Please rely on me."

"I will. I have." She murmured. His touch was light, barely a caress, yet she felt it all the way to the tips of her toes. 

The tea kettle singing on the stove startled them both, breaking the spell they found themselves in for the moment.

She gulped and moved to place the kettle to the side and turned off the stove. "I-I've just to set the table for breakfast, Ha Jun. Will you stay and have breakfast with me?"

"I was hoping you'd ask, " was his quick reply, causing her to smile in response.

He had helped her set the table after that and together they ate and talked about their plans for the day. His was his appointment with Dr. Kim, while she had to see Ms. Choi in the evening to assist her with some paper work tasks. It was a comfortable time they spent together. And as Ha Jun looked back to their morning, he could not help but crave more of her time, of being in her presence. He is falling hard and fast, and he is quite anxious at the speed his affection seem to be progressing. He got to thinking if Ha Jae had felt this way each time he fell for a girl; or if was this because he himself had never been in love before unlike his brother who was free with his affections. And once again, he missed having Ha Jae around to talk with about things like these. He would have spent hours talking to his brother about Seon Mi, and undoubtedly, Ha Jae would be full and effusive with his teasing and commentaries.

He rubbed his forehead suddenly tired, the thought of Seon Mi intruding on his mind making him miss her again. He wanted to see her, but feared he might be pushing her too fast. And his thoughts wandered once more at the way she looked back at him that morning in the kitchen, with her pinked cheeks, her teeth worrying her lips, her large brown eyes staring back at him shyly yet bravely holding his gaze. He could easily get lost in the depths of those eyes...I already have, he thought, I'm falling and I'm drowning and for once I don't care if I survive.

.

Meanwhile Seon Mi is tidying up at the office. Ms. Choi had completed her other session this evening and left immediately afterwards. She had asked Seon Mi's help in finishing up and typing up the reports. Ms. Choi relies heavily on her whenever quarterly reports are due in order to keep abreast with the requirements for their funding. And Seon Mi found out she has a knack in pulling data elements and compiling them in spreadsheets and reports for submission. She had easily completed these and filed away the paperwork; now she walked through the other rooms cleaning up, putting away chairs, wiping down the counter in the little kitchen and other general upkeep. She just finished washing up when she was startled to hear a knock on the front door. Ms. Choi had locked up to avoid unnecessary intrusion in the facility while Seon Mi was by herself after Mr. Do had to leave early too. Mr. Do must have come back for his umbrella, she thought, as she hurried out to the front.

But it was Ha Jun who stood behind the glass panelled door, his hand still raised as if to deliver additional knocks on the door. 

She hurriedly unlocked the doors to usher him in. "I thought it was Mr. Do." She noticed his face was a mask of worry. "What's wrong Ha Jun?" She turned to him after locking the door once more.

"It's close to midnight and I had been calling to see if you had made it home. I didn't hear from you." He ran his hands through his windblown hair, tousling it more.

"Oh. I was tidying up and left my phone in the office," gesturing behind her. "I must not have heard it when I was washing in the kitchen. Is it midnight already?"

"I knew you would be here but didn't think you'd be this late. I got worried."

"I didn't mean to worry you." She reached a hand out to his arm, touched by his concern. It has been a while someone worried about her, whether she got home on time, or if she had been out late at night; easily forgetting Ms. Choi does the same thing every now and then. But Ms. Choi is not this handsome young man, standing quite close to her and staring at her again with those eyes that make her heart beat wildly in her chest.

"The last bus came and left; come, I'll take you home. Are you done here?" 

"I did lose track of time. Yes. Thank you. I'll just get my phone and keys."

His hand stopped her briefly from rushing away, and she had to look up at him, standing so close to her as he is. He is so tall, she thought, her thoughts jumping wildly as he took another step closer, putting him just mere inches away.

"I'm glad you're ok. I can't help but worry about you now, you know that, right?" he murmured softly.

She found her voice gone with the nearness of him and was only able to nod her head mutely to his question.

"I care about you Seon Mi. I don't want to waste another minute without letting you know." He touched her cheeks with his thumb, tracing its curve down to her lips, ghosting its shape; his touch light but setting her nerve endings on overdrive. "I want to know if you feel the same for me." 

Her pulse feels so loud in her ears, almost drowning out his whispered words. "I do," she managed to whisper back, embarrassed to hear  how breathless her voice sounded. 

She was rewarded by his sharp intake of breath, the way the tips of his ears had reddened. And she could not help but stare at his lips, how full and generous and soft they look; the way they parted when he caught her staring and how they both seem to stop breathing altogether that very moment.

Ha Jun didn't need further prompting; her eyes fluttered close as he dipped down to brush his lips to hers, finally sharing their first kiss. 

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  *****credit chapter cover pic to lovelikeoxytocin**** thank you